The medieval manor was a unit of
administration and, although some manors were geographicaly compact and well-defined, many included possessions
which were widely dispersed throughout the county or sometimes beyond. It was thus that
Christchurch was divided into two manors; the secular
and the Priory Manor of Christchurch Twyneham.
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The Roman
villae were large farming estates usually set about a central
villa. They were owned by a wealthy Roman but worked by British slaves.
Some have sugested that the villae did
not disappear completely when the Romans departed
the British Isles early in the 5th century but that they were the pattern for the
Saxon and Mediaeval manors.
This is most unlikely, firstly because manors were universal whereas the
villae were not with the majority
of the population living in villages and, secondly, whereas all freemen attended the
Anglo-Saxon hundred courts, all on the Roman villa were subject to the autocratic
will of the owner.
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The manor would be the feudal possession of a lord who held it of the
monarch and manorial affairs and justice within its boundaries which was not reserved
for the King's courts would be administered by the court leet which met in the
Old Court House in
Castle Street (the Priory manor had it's own
court house adjacent the Priory
gates in Church Street). It was at the court leet that rents and other feudal dues would
be collected.
The first lord of the manor here under the Norman Kings was Robert de
Redvers, first Earl of Devon, who erected the town's first castle in the early 12th
century. Richard, the second Earl of Devon, held the manor from 1155 until 1162 and built
the Constable's House (sometimes known as the Norman House or Castle Hall) in about 1160.
Several changes of ownership of the manor led to its passing from the
Earls of Devon into the possession of the powerful Nevilles, Earls of Warwick. Thus was
established the connection between the Priory
and Margaret, Countess of Salisbury and
grand-daughter of Warwick 'the King-maker'. The last of the Plantagenet line, Margaret
was executed by King Henry VIII who refused to allow her body to be interred in the
Salisbury Chapel she had built for the purpose in the
Priory.
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The Constable's House,
a mdieval domestic building occupied by the official in charge of the castle during the
absence of the lord of the manor.
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The tower of the 12th-century
Priory Church which gave the place it's name
still dominates the skyline of the town centre.
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The Constable's House,
a mdieval domestic building occupied by the official in charge of the castle during the
absence of the lord of the manor.
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Christchurch or Twynham
Castle - a strong-hold in the violent Middle Ages.
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The Priory Manor
was quite seperate from the secular manor
and had its own Court House in Church
Street.
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The Old Court House in
Castle Street where the Court Leet met and the
Corporation's officrs were elected until the Victorian reforms of local government.
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Dating from the 15th-century, the three
late mediaeval cottages at the
southern end of Church Street mark the wane of the Dark Ages.
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MEDIEVAL CHRISTCHURCH
Recommend a Book for this Page
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